


Restoration, Reparation

by DivineProjectZero



Category: Be More Chill - Iconis/Tracz
Genre: Alternative Universe - Animals, Depression, Fluff, Gen, Mental Health Issues, Panic Attacks, Past Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Recovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-30
Updated: 2017-10-30
Packaged: 2019-01-26 11:30:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12556444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DivineProjectZero/pseuds/DivineProjectZero
Summary: "We're not adopting this cat," Brooke tells Michael firmly.(in which Michael is a dog, Jeremy is a cat, and neither of them are the protagonist.)





	Restoration, Reparation

**Author's Note:**

  * For [reptilianraven](https://archiveofourown.org/users/reptilianraven/gifts).



> Self-betaed. All mistakes are mine. Constructive feedback is always welcome.
> 
> Tagged pairs can be interpreted as romantic or platonic relationships. It's not important in this story.
> 
> For Bird, who deserves so much happiness, and for everybody else out there who is having a rough time. I hope this makes you smile.

It’s three minutes to seven when Brooke feels a weight press onto her stomach, specifically right over her bladder. She ignores it.

She hears a soft mewl. She ignores it.

Then, a louder, insistent meow that Brooke recognizes as the beginning of a hundred more pestering sounds, and she admits defeat, opening her eyes to look into the large feline ones staring intently at her face.

“Hey Jeremy,” Brooke says blearily. “You couldn’t have waited until my alarm rang?”

A short meow says _no_.

“Fine,” Brooke says, and turns her head to see another pair of eyes peeking at her from beside the bed. “Good morning, Michael.” She sighs and reaches for her alarm clock. “I don’t know why I bother setting an alarm when you guys keep waking me up before it rings.”

Michael perks up, his tail thumping against the bedroom floor as Brooke pushes herself upright, and Brooke gives him a quick scratch behind his ears. The tail thumps grow louder.

Satisfied that Brooke is awake and therefore about to serve them food, Jeremy jumps off the bed, trotting towards the door. He stops to give her an expectant look when she doesn’t immediately follow.

“Coming, coming,” Brooke says with a yawn. Despite all her mock annoyance, she feels warm and happy.

It’s nice to have a family to get out of bed for.

-

Here’s how Michael becomes part of Brooke’s life:

Brooke is a weepy, gloomy mess of a human being stuffed into a pink hoodie and bunny slippers subsisting on only Chinese takeout and microwave pizza and ice cream for almost an entire month until Jenna finally decides enough is enough.

“This is an intervention,” Jenna says, and shoves Brooke into the running shower, hoodie and all.

Once Brooke meets humane hygiene standards, Jenna drives her to the nearest animal shelter.

“What are we doing here?” Brooke asks.

“You’ve been living on my couch and cuddling my dog for a month because you can’t stand sleeping in your empty house all alone,” Jenna says. “So get your own dog, go live in your house, and get your shit together.” She points at a sad-eyed poodle peering up at them from inside a cage. “That one’s cute.”

“But—I can hardly take care of myself,” Brooke says. It stings to admit that out loud.

Jenna gives her an appraising look. “Yeah, I know. I’ve been watching you impersonate a flaming trainwreck for the past month.” She taps a finger against Brooke’s chest. “But you resembled a functioning human being whenever you helped take care of Christine. So think about it.”

Then Jenna drags her over to another cage that holds a cheerful Pomeranian that looks a lot like Jenna’s, except Christine is a shock of black fur while this one is a tawny ball of fluff. Brooke lets the dog sniff her fingers, her heart warming at the way it paws at the cage, trying to get closer. She thinks it could be nice, to have something warm and alive in her cold, empty house, full of half-spaces that used to be occupied by Ethan. It would be nice to not be alone.

The temptation pulls at her bones as she takes a long look around, listening to the staff’s recommendations. She sees a small lump of black, white, and brown looking at her, a pink tongue peeking out of its mouth, and she steps closer, magnetized.

“This one’s a Bernese mountain dog,” the shelter employee explains when Brooke kneels in front of the puppy. “He’s three months old, so he’s small right now, but he’ll grow for a couple more years. He’ll be a big one.”

The puppy perks up when she offers him her hand, licking her knuckles with tail-wagging enthusiasm, and Brooke’s heart melts on the spot.

A week later, she takes Michael home and lets him sleep on the bed next to her. He’s warm and soft and snuffly as he wriggles close to her and licks her chin, and Brooke decides that she’s going to start applying to jobs again tomorrow. It’s the first night since the breakup that she doesn’t cry herself to sleep.

-

Once she’s emailed the finished designs to her team leader, Brooke stretches with a sigh, happy to be free for the rest of the day. She’s already walked Michael and Jeremy earlier this morning, but the weather’s nice outside and there’s still at least another hour before she needs to cook dinner. A short walk might be a good way to work up an appetite.

Humming, she pads out to the living room in search of the two trouble-makers, and she finds them napping in the sunlight, Michael splayed out on his stomach with all paws pointed outwards while Jeremy sits primly on his back, paws curled under him so that he resembles a toasted loaf of bread. Brooke takes a moment to snap a photo and silently coo over them, watching the way Jeremy’s nose twitches in his sleep.

The photo makes Jeremy look tiny, even if he isn’t _that_ small. Compared to Michael, who’s three years old but the size of a seven-year-old child, most cats look small. It doesn’t help that Jeremy’s very skinny, despite Brooke’s best efforts to fatten him up. 

She posts the photo on Instagram—she made an account just for these two a year ago, and now she has twenty-eight-thousand followers, which is _insane_ —and manages to catch another photo of Jeremy yawning his way back to the land of wakefulness, all his sharp little teeth on display. He lazily blinks up at her, tail flicking in curiosity.

“Hey, sleepyhead,” Brooke says, leaning in slow and steady so Jeremy has ample opportunity to express discomfort, and she grins when he rubs the side of his face against her outstretched hand. Permission granted, she pets him for a minute. 

Michael grumbles into the carpet, eyes slitting open, and Brooke laughs. 

“Did I wake you? Sorry.” She pets Michael too, as an apology, and he forgives her by nudging his head against her palm. “You guys wanna go for a walk?”

Michael’s tail starts to wag.

“Yeah, let’s go for a walk,” Brooke says, standing up, and Michael follows suit. Jeremy slides off of Michael’s back with a disgruntled noise, which immediately turns into an offended cheep when Michael gives his face a big lick. Jeremy bats at Michael’s nose in offense, but his claws stay retracted. Undeterred, Michael nuzzles Jeremy while Brooke fetches their leashes, and by the time she’s clasping the harness around Jeremy, his tail is curling upright, mood improved. 

Walking with Jeremy and Michael is not as physically demanding as most people think. Michael always ambles along at a leisurely pace when he's on a leash, rarely ever dragging Brooke ahead unless he smells food, and Jeremy often needs to stop and twitch, his ears flicking as he monitors for potential danger. Every pedestrian they come across is another thirty seconds of Jeremy darting between Michael's legs to give suspicious glares at the passerby while Brooke smiles and offers no explanation, because she’s decided she’s done with repeating herself. She should carry business cards instead. _He isn't anti-social, he's just a scaredy cat!_

“Why don't you just let Jeremy stay home and take only Michael?” Jenna once asked. It’s not like Brooke didn’t think of that. Cats don't really need to be walked, and Michael's the kind of breed that needs a lot of exercise, after all. But Michael had whined and moped and flat-out refused to go beyond the front gate without Jeremy, miserable no matter how much Brooke coaxed him with treats, so she’d resigned herself to slow, halting walks with both of them. At one point, she'd tried getting a cat carrier backpack to safely escort Jeremy around in instead, but Jeremy'd cried so much when she tried to zip him inside that she'd guiltily got a refund and gave him the expensive snacks for a week. So this is their routine now.

Brooke doesn’t mind taking the slow route. It’s relaxing. Michael seems to enjoy it, too. He’s always happy to match Jeremy’s pace or to watch Jeremy hiss at the garden gnome on Mrs. Gomez’s lawn or to carry him through the rest of the walk whenever Jeremy decides he’s tired and wants to hitch a ride on Michael’s back. It might be slow, but it’s never boring.

-

Here’s how Jeremy becomes part of Brooke’s life:

It’s been six weeks since Brooke brought Michael home, and Brooke is making progress. She's slowly uprighting the collapsed architecture of her life, redecorating and pet-proofing the whole house, and starting a new job at a small but busy graphic design agency. She's not ready to resuscitate her social life just yet, but she's not in a hurry. She wants to focus on herself right now. Herself and Michael.

Michael is a veritable ball of fluffy sunshine, a little lazy but friendly, and always up for a cuddle. He's fairly mild-mannered and well-behaved for a puppy, according to Jenna, who had once jokingly told Christine to learn from him (Christine, of course, didn't). 

So it comes as a complete surprise on a sunny Saturday morning when Michael pauses mid-walk, ears perking up, then throws his entire body weight forward, straining against his leash in an effort to run towards the bushes. Brooke squeaks with surprise, grabbing onto the leash with both hands. Michael is still a puppy, but he's growing—he’s a veritable canine vacuum when it comes to food—and in a year or so, he's definitely going to be able to drag Brooke if he wants. 

But right now, he's still weaker than Brooke, so he's caught at the edge of the park's footpath, whining as he tries to struggle forward.

"What? Is there something there?" Brooke asks. Michael's chased the odd squirrel before, but it's always been half-hearted at best; he's never pulled on his leash so hard before. 

Curious, Brooke takes hold of the leash so that Michael can only stray a couple feet from her, then slowly approaches the bushes. 

"I don't see anything," Brooke says as Michael noses his way into the foliage. She tugs at his leash, stalling him, but Michael whines at her, so she sighs and lets him do whatever he's trying to do. Maybe he just really wants to pee here, who knows. 

She hears a prolonged scuffling sound, then Michael reappears with a happy bark, muffled by the rag he has dangling from his mouth. 

Wait.

That’s not a rag.

The scraggly brown scrap of fur hanging from Michael's mouth opens its mouth and lets out an angry screech.

“Is that a _cat_?” 

It is, in fact, the scrawniest kitten that Brooke has ever seen. She rescues the poor thing from Michael, who just wags his tail, tongue lolling out as he grins down at the kitten still screeching at the top of its tiny lungs. 

Unsure of whether Michael has unwittingly catnapped a kitten from its mother, Brooke spends an hour searching the park for any signs of the cat's family, then contemplates what to do next. The kitten doesn't look well-fed, and when she sets it down on the park trail, it limps a few steps away before Michael snatches it up again by the scruff of its neck. 

It's obvious that leaving this kitten in the park isn't going to be an option, so Brooke carries it back to the house and deposits it into the backseat of her car. She lifts Michael into the front, but he immediately wriggles his way to the back and flops his head onto the kitten, unheeding of its protesting noises.

"We're not adopting this cat," Brooke tells Michael firmly. Her hands are a mess of scratch marks, thanks to the kitten's claws, as she turns the ignition. 

"We're not adopting this cat," she reminds Michael as the vet examines the kitten. She feels something deep in her stomach twist when she hears the words _beaten_ and _abused_ , as the kitten hisses and cries and cowers away from human touch. It’s barely five months old.

"We're not adopting this cat," Brooke says, closing the car door behind her, ready to drive out of the shelter's parking lot. Michael looks up at her with the biggest, saddest puppy eyes and whimpers.

"Fuck it, we're adopting this cat," Brooke says, and goes back inside the shelter.

Two weeks later, the kitten's leg is completely healed and Brooke is finally permitted to take him home. She can see the glimpse of the beautiful cat he could grow into, now that he's been bathed and fed, cautiously examining the space of Brooke’s living room floor. And as Michael greets Jeremy with an enthusiastic barrage of licks while Jeremy attempts and fails to swat him away, she thinks she can see the beginning of a beautiful friendship, too.

-

"Yo, Brooke!" Rich calls, waving her over to the table he's sitting at. The sushi place two blocks away from Brooke's office is tucked into a narrow space that can barely seat two dozen people, so she spots him immediately.

"Hey." Brooke greets Rich with a quick hug and turns towards the other person seated across from Rich, but her attention snags first on the golden retriever sitting unobtrusively under the table, his head poking out to regard her with an inquisitive gaze. Below the curious eyes and the pink slip of tongue, there's a flash of a service vest.

"Brooke, this is Chloe," Rich says, redirecting Brooke's attention back to the dog's owner, who is the prettiest girl she's ever seen in her life. "Chloe, this is Brooke."

Brooke instinctively sticks out a hand, still a little taken aback by how striking this girl's eyes are. "Hi, nice to meet you."

"Likewise," Chloe says and gives Brooke's hand a brisk shake.

"And that's Jake," Rich says, gesturing at the dog peeking up at them. "He's Chloe's assistant."

"He's adorable," Brooke says. She restrains herself from cooing or asking if she can pet him because she knows better than to bother a dog on duty. She turns back to Rich. "Did you order yet?"

He pulls out the chair beside his for Brooke to sit. "Nah, we're still deciding."

After they order a large sushi platter and two appetizers for the three of them to share, Rich takes a long sip from his soda and says, "Okay, so Chloe's new to town—kinda? She's been here a couple months now—and she doesn't really know anybody else with a dog. We thought it'd be a good idea if we got Jakey here a friend, you know?"

"Like a playdate?" Brooke asks, peering under the table to see Jake curled up by Chloe's feet, using her Jimmy Choos as a pillow. It’d be a refreshing change for Michael to play with somebody his own size for once. "That might be nice."

"Rich says you have a cat, too," Chloe says , "and that it comes as a package deal with the dog."

Brooke feels herself tense up in preemptive defensiveness. She’s heard the occasional derisive comment about how codependent her boys are over the past two and a half years, and those piss her off every time. “Yeah, that’s non-negotiable.”

Chloe blinks. “That’s…not a problem. I just wanted to know if your cat would be okay with meeting Jake. I know some cats don’t take to strangers very well.”

The tension drains away at once, leaving only simmering embarrassment behind. “He’s pretty shy, but it should be okay.” Brooke wants to go hide in the bathroom forever. “Sorry if I came off as, um, aggressive.”

“It’s fine.” The corner of Chloe’s mouth ticks up just the slightest bit. “I’ve said worse things to better people.”

Rich nods. “Chloe’s used to party with Wall Street folks. She’s heard it all.”

“Oh? You’re from New York?” Brooke asks. It fits, somehow. Chloe looks like the kind of girl who belongs on the busy streets of Manhattan. A little…impersonal.

Chloe nods, her eyes flicking down to her glass of water. “Yeah. It was time for a change of scenery.”

There’s a stony set to Chloe’s jaw that stops Brooke from asking what Chloe’s doing in suburban New Jersey. Instead, she circles back to the topic that’s brought them together in the first place: “So did Rich tell you anything about Michael and Jeremy aside from the fact that they’re inseparable?”

Chloe looks back up, the tension in her shoulders bleeding out. “Not really. He keeps saying that Michael’s breed is a ‘big buddy.’”

Brooke gives Rich an exasperated look. “Rich.”

“What, he’s a big dog! That’s all that matters,” Rich says.

“I have pictures, if you wanna see them,” Brooke says, and Chloe nods, her eyes lighting up, and she doesn’t look impersonal or detached at all. Brooke feels a little warm as she hands over her phone with the Instagram app open. “Michael’s a Bernese mountain dog and Jeremy’s an Abyssinian.” 

Rich sighs, his eyes crinkling at the corners with something akin to satisfaction as he watches Chloe smile at the photos. “Man, I miss Dusty.”

“Dusty?” Chloe echoes, glancing up.

“Yeah, he was a chihuahua about this big.” Rich holds up his hands to demonstrate the tiny size. “Had him since I was a kid til he went to dog heaven a few years back.”

“You named your dog _Dusty_ ,” Chloe says slowly.

“He was always getting into nooks and crannies and getting dust all over him. I gave him the Cinderella of names!”

Chloe gives him a suffering look. 

Brooke laughs. "So, when do you wanna schedule that playdate?"

-

Here's how they become a family:

It's been three months since Jeremy became part of their household, and he's recently taken to scratching the bedroom door in the mornings, regardless of whether Brooke leaves the door open or not. He's still skittish around her, keeping a safe distance most of the time, and hiding away entirely whenever Jenna comes over, but he's slowly spending more and more time in the same room as Brooke. At least Jeremy seems to be okay with Michael forever invading his personal space, so she thinks there's hope for improvement.

But today, she wakes up to the sound of scratching and she doesn't see any hope at all. She drags her feet as she forces herself towards the kitchen, Michael circling her in worried circles, and she goes through the motions of pouring food into bowls and giving Michael his morning scritches. She isn't hungry, but there's a gaping sense of emptiness yawning in her chest, so she stands and stares at the fridge's contents for a long time, wondering what to eat. In the end, she can't make up her mind, so she decides to think about it after a short rest on the couch.

The rest on the couch lasts thirty minutes. An hour. Three hours. Vaguely, she realizes she's hungry, but she can't muster the energy to cook anything. She can't muster the energy to _do_ anything. She should eat, and shower, and take the boys out for a walk. She can't just waste a whole day doing nothing.

Brooke watches the hours slip away and the sunlight fade away from the living room and remembers, with vicious clarity, the last time she'd spent an entire Sunday playing Candy Crush on her phone, too weary to face reality or her own suffocating mind, and how it had all ended with Ethan yelling _it's because you're like this, it's because you're the goddamn problem_.

She remembers thinking _I know, I know, I'm sorry I'm like this_. She remembers grasping for words to explain that she was _trying_ and coming up empty. She remembers how she hadn't yelled, hadn't even been able to scrounge up the rage over all his infidelities coming to light, how she'd listened to him pushing all the blame onto the apathy that had been strangling her throat for so long. In the end, Jenna had been the one to come throw Ethan out, while Brooke had huddled under her blankets, trying to reassemble the shattered pieces of herself into a semblance of the Brooke Lohst that had loved this boy and instead only finding all the passion and joy bleached away, her world gone monochrome.

A warm tongue licks at her knuckles, bringing Brooke back to the present. She looks down to see Michael whimpering, pushing his snout against the back of her hand.

"I'm okay," Brooke reassures him, rubbing the soft fuzz on the top of his head. The lie stings at her dry throat and her voice rasps a little. "I'm okay, really."

Then, a small weight suddenly presses onto her thigh, Jeremy stepping onto her legs from the couch cushions, a purr rumbling in his chest as he regards her curiously. He makes a soft chirping sound and butts his head against her chin, rubbing warm fur against her skin, and Brooke's breath catches in her throat. She raises a cautious, trembling hand to Jeremy's back, and he doesn't flinch away when she holds him closer. He only purrs louder, and the warm, rumbling weight of him against her collarbone breaks her open.

She cries for a long time with Jeremy nuzzling against the underside of her chin and Michael joining Jeremy on her lap, trying to lick her tears away. She cries into their fur until the colors come back into the world and the ache in her chest has been dulled, until Jeremy decides he's done and squirms away. 

Then Michael tackles Jeremy off the couch and snuggles him as Jeremy screeches in offense, and Brooke breaks out into laughter.

-

“So how do you know Rich?” Brooke asks, watching Jake and Michael chase each other on the grass. Jeremy’s opted to sit on the bench with Brooke, tucked neatly next to her thigh on the side opposite of Chloe. So far, the whole playdate is going swimmingly. Michael and Jake hit it off within a minute of meeting each other, and Jeremy seems to tolerate Jake and Chloe’s presence. Brooke is enjoying the view and the warmth of Jeremy under her fingertips, so she almost misses the way Chloe tenses up fast at the innocuous question.

“I got lost,” Chloe says. The words sound mechanic. Rehearsed. “And he helped me out.”

From the corner of her eye, Brooke observes the rigid set of Chloe’s shoulders and the straightening of her spine, and then turns back to watch Jake tumble over Michael with a loud bark. “Sounds like Rich. He’s a good person, even if he can be, well. A lot.” Brooke rubs the spot right between Jeremy’s ears and watches his eyes close lazily in enjoyment. “Did you know,” Brooke says casually, “that Rich and I met through Tinder?”

That shocks a laugh out of Chloe. “Seriously?”

“Yeah. I got the app as a joke, I guess?” More like Jenna had pestered her into it, citing that she needed entertainment and that Brooke needed to start having a social life again. “And I didn’t really expect much from a dating app, to be honest. Got a few creeps, but Rich seemed like a genuinely decent person. Plus, he’s cute.”

Chloe shrugs, smirking. “I guess, if you’re into that.”

“Oh, shut up,” Brooke says, grinning. “Plus his profile said he was a firefighter, and I thought that, you know, somebody who rescues people for a living can’t be a bad idea.”

“Somebody who rescues people for a living,” Chloe repeats. “I guess that makes sense.”

“It did for me,” Brooke says with a shrug. “We went out for coffee once and I really liked him. Not in a romantic sense, but as a person.” Maybe it had been because of how starved Brooke had been for human contact. She’d been overwhelmed with gratitude to simply have another person in her life. “And Rich was on the same wavelength. So we met up a couple more times and then decided to stay friends.”

“Huh.” Jake runs up to their bench and props his head on Chloe’s knees, grinning as he pants. Chloe starts petting his head absentmindedly as she slants an unreadable look towards Brooke. “How long ago was this?”

“Almost two years ago,” Brooke says. 

Chloe looks at Brooke for another long moment, then turns her head to Jake. “Hm.”

Before Brooke can ask anything, Michael distracts her by trotting up to the bench and looking up at her expectantly with happy, hopeful eyes. She leans forward to scratch him under his chin and the happy, blissed-out look intensifies, the tip of his tongue peeking out. It doesn’t stay that way for long, though, because Jeremy reaches out with one paw to push the tongue back into Michael’s mouth.

“Let him blep, you bully,” she tells Jeremy.

It takes Brooke a few seconds to realize that the odd noise that she just heard is a snort, followed by a series of muffled chuckles. She watches Chloe slap a hand over her mouth and laugh, her whole body shaking with mirth, and Brooke can’t really find the capacity in her to be embarrassed about what she just said when Chloe’s snickering like that.

“I’m not laughing at you,” Chloe says between breathless giggles. “It’s just—wow. I haven’t laughed like that in a long time.”

That’s a shame, Brooke thinks. Chloe’s laughter is one of the sweetest sounds she’s ever heard. 

“Well, you’ll probably see more of me being dumb with these two,” Brooke says. She’s not as good as Rich at offering a hand of friendship, but she gets the feeling that she needs to be the one to extend the invitation right now. She thinks Chloe needs it. “If you want to hang out some more.”

Chloe blinks once, twice. Clears her throat and ducks her head down to face Jake instead. “Yeah.” Her voice is soft and cautious, brimming with hope. “I’d like that.”

-

There are still bad days.

Some days Brooke wakes up and wants to go back to sleep, to never wake up again. Some days she feels miserable no matter how much Michael and Jeremy offer her cuddles.

Some days, it’s not Brooke who’s having a bad day.

There are times when Jeremy curls up into a tight ball, bristling with anxiety, and nothing Brooke offers him will help. Her chest aches at how there’s nothing she can do but wait him out. 

Thankfully, there’s Michael.

Whenever Jeremy hides away into himself, Michael curls up around the trembling ball of golden-brown fur in a warm, protective circle. They stay like that for however long it takes, until Jeremy shakes off his black mood and gets up, bumping his nose against Michael’s in a gesture of thanks. Afterwards, he’ll come winding his way around Brooke’s feet with a petulant meow, asking to be spoiled, and Brooke always gives in.

They’re quite the pair, she thinks. It’s a good thing Michael is around to balance out the neurotic counterparts of the household, because Brooke isn’t sure Jeremy or herself would survive otherwise.

On bath days, for example, Jeremy always goes hiding because water is his mortal enemy, and Brooke can never find him. It’s Michael who always sniffs Jeremy out and snatches him up by the scruff of his neck to carry him to the bathroom while Jeremy yowls in betrayal. Once Brooke is done bathing and drying a sulky, grumbly cat, Michael bears the burden of flopping over Jeremy and nuzzling him back to a better mood. 

“Are you sure they’re not gay for each other?” Jenna asks, watching Jeremy lick the patch of fur on top of Michael’s head. Jeremy’s attempts at grooming Michael always end in Jeremy huffing and bapping Michael with a paw for being so big, but it’s never stopped him from re-attempting. Brooke isn’t sure if Jeremy’s memory is just that bad or if his cat logic has somehow led him to believe that Michael will somehow be smaller the next time he tries.

“I don’t think so?” Brooke says. “I mean, even if they were, it wouldn’t really matter.”

Jenna takes a video of Jeremy smacking the tip of Michael’s tongue back into his mouth. “I guess not.”

-

By the fourth playdate, Brooke’s mapped out a vague sense of safe territories of conversation with Chloe. 

Asking about why she’s relocated to New Jersey or anything about the past year before she met Brooke is a bad idea. Given that Jake is almost three years old, Brooke is pretty sure Jake became a part of Chloe’s life sometime during that past year. She doesn’t ask why or how or when. She doesn’t ask.

Instead, she talks about herself. She talks about her favorite foods and her celebrity crushes and favored brands of makeup. She talks about Jeremy and Michael. She talks and watches Chloe’s eyes go wide or narrow and measures the warmth of her smile so she can navigate the waters of Chloe Valentine safely.

“So Rich was like, ‘if lozenges are good for a sore throat and tea is good for a sore throat, then taking them together is even better for a sore throat,’ right?” Brooke is relating this story with relish as they walk through the park, Jeremy and Michael on their leashes while Jake enjoys his brief bout of freedom, bouncing around Chloe and Brooke in jubilant circles. “So he goes and swallows the lozenge with his tea like it’s a pill.”

“That’s _not_ how lozenges work,” Chloe says, laughing.

“That’s what I told him!”

Their laughter is cut short when a doberman that was passing next to them starts barking, loud and angry, straining forward against its leash in a clear aborted attempt to lunge at Jeremy, who arches his back and flattens his ears in a defensive hiss. The doberman is muzzled, thank god, but Brooke feels her stomach clench in fear as she steps away, trying to pull Jeremy out of sight. 

“I’m so sorry,” the owner babbles, trying to pull his dog away, but the doberman growls and refuses to budge. “He doesn’t like cats. Shit, sorry.”

Chloe takes a step sideways and puts herself between Brooke and the doberman, and Jake goes still beside her, eyes wary.

And then a sound Brooke’s never heard before erupts from Michael. He’s growling, lips pulled back to show all his teeth and the pink of his gums, hunched protectively over Jeremy. Brooke’s didn’t even know that Michael could snarl, but he’s rather menacing when he does.

She’s not sure if Michael’s display worked or if the doberman lost interest, but soon the owner tugs the dog away, apologizing over his shoulder one more time.

Once the doberman is out of sight, Jeremy creeps out from under Michael and gently rubs against his legs with a plaintive meow. Immediately, the snarl drops from Michael’s face as he huffs and gives Jeremy a nuzzle and a nose bump. 

“Wow,” Chloe finally comments.

“Yeah,” Brooke says. She feels a little shaken.

Chloe must notice, because she immediately directs their little pack towards the nearest bench so Brooke can sit. “You need anything?”

“No, it’s fine.” It helps to have Michael plopping his head onto her knee, looking up at her with big, adoring eyes that remind her that this is Michael, who sometimes wags his tail with so much enthusiasm that he accidentally smacks Jeremy in the face with it. This is her Michael. She can feel Jeremy head-butting her shin. He’s okay. Everything’s fine.

After a few minutes, Chloe settles a careful hand on Brooke’s shoulder, and the weight of it reassures her. It helps her pull herself together. Chloe’s voice is quiet as she asks, “You okay?”

“Yeah,” Brooke says, and she finds that she means it. “Thank you.”

Chloe shrugs, her cheeks a little pink as she removes her hand from Brooke’s shoulder. “I didn’t really do anything.”

_You did_ , Brooke doesn’t say. _You placed yourself between me and what you saw as a threat_. Instead she smiles and says, “Thanks for being here.”

For a moment, Chloe’s mouth opens and no words come out, like there’s too many of them tangled in her throat. Like she doesn’t know which ones to say. Then her mouth clicks shut as she clears her throat, and she says, “You’re welcome.”

-

As time goes by, the good days steadily outnumber the bad ones.

Brooke works at the office and has dinner with friends and posts photos of Jeremy and Michael being adorable on Instagram. She crawls into bed at night exhausted but satisfied, and wakes up in the mornings to Jeremy sitting on her stomach and Michael waiting at her bedside.

She surveys the life she’s rebuilt over the past couple years and likes what she sees. She loves her lazy Sundays, blasting soft rock and reggae on her portable speakers—because Jenna once said that apparently dogs like that kind of music, and it turns out that Michael _loves_ that kind of music—and watching Michael laze on his side while Jeremy kneads at his stomach, purring in satisfaction. She loves stretching out on the couch and being joined by two warm, furry lumps for an afternoon nap. 

On the good days, she loves her life.

-

A little over six months since their first meeting, Brooke finds out why Chloe has Jake.

They’re in Pinkberry when it happens. Michael and Jeremy are at home and Brooke is using her afternoon off to spoil herself, and Chloe happens to be available and nearby. They’ve just finished their frozen yogurt and are busy discussing Gilmore Girls when something behind the counter breaks with a piercing, shattering noise, causing all the customers to jump. 

“Sorry, nothing wrong here,” a staff member says, and Brooke turns her head back to Chloe to pick up the thread of their conversation except—Chloe’s gone pale as a sheet, her eyes unfocused. From under the table, Brooke can hear Jake whine.

“Chloe?”

She makes the mistake of laying a hand on Chloe’s arm. Chloe flinches away, her gaze skittering over Brooke like she doesn’t recognize her, and then she turns and flees the store with Jake in tow.

Cursing herself, Brooke follows.

They end up sitting on a bench in front of the town library, Jake coaxing Chloe back out of her head with wet licks to her face while Brooke stands in front of the bench, unsure of what to do or what to say.

“Do you need anything?” She asks, because it’s the only thing that comes to mind.

Chloe shakes her head. “I just need a minute.” 

“Okay,” Brooke says, and tries to ignore all the little voices in her head that shove jigsaw puzzle pieces into her hands, demanding that she put them together. She doesn’t need to know beyond what Chloe is willing to tell her, but her mind drags out all the clues into the open, relentless.

_Chloe has a service dog to help her through panic attacks. Chloe got a service dog recently around the same time period she had to relocate from New York City. Chloe doesn’t drink alcohol, same as Rich._

_Shut the fuck up_ , Brooke tells her brain, and focuses on the way the ragged rhythm of Chloe’s breathing evens out, watches the slow strokes of Chloe’s hands through Jake’s fur.

“I’m sorry,” Chloe says.

“You didn’t do anything wrong,” Brooke says.

Chloe huffs, dry and sarcastic. “You wouldn’t say that if you knew.”

“Maybe,” Brooke says, because she knows that sugarcoating and platitudes are meaningless. “Maybe not. There’s only one way for you to find out.” 

Chloe makes a small choking sound, like her lungs are full of the words that never make it past her throat. “I don’t know if I want to find out.”

Brooke crouches down to look up into Chloe’s eyes, even if they don’t fully meet her gaze. “Chloe,” she says softly, “you don’t owe me anything. You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to. I’ll still be your friend, even if you never tell me.” She lifts her hand to pet one of Jake’s paws in lieu of touching Chloe. She’s not sure Chloe would welcome that kind of comfort right now. “But if you want to talk, I’m willing to listen.”

For a long, silent moment, Chloe doesn’t respond, and Brooke’s chest feels too tight.

Then Chloe inhales, shaky and small, and says, “Give me a little time.”

“Yeah, of course.” The pressure in Brooke’s chest dissolves, gives her space to breathe. She can wait. She’s good at waiting. “However long you need.”

They stay like that for a while, both silently stroking Jake’s fur, fingertips inches from each other.

-

Brooke loves her life the way it is right now. She loves taking hot showers while Jeremy meows sadly outside, worried that she’s on the verge of drowning, and cooking new recipes for dinner while Michael casts ever-hopeful looks at her for scraps. She loves going to work at the office or working from home or spending a day off in her pajamas. She loves the sense of being a self-sufficient, functioning human being. 

She loves her family the way it is right now, her and Michael and Jeremy.

She’s not entirely sure if she’s reliable enough to be somebody else’s support system just yet, but she thinks she should try.

Jeremy’s in a good mood today. He’s purring and rubbing his face against Michael’s, curling his tail around one of Michael’s paws, and Brooke’s taking a video of them when she gets a phone call from Chloe.

“There’s a place I want you to come with me,” Chloe says.

It’s surprising to realize that when the moment comes, Brooke feels ready.

“Okay,” she says, and reaches her fist out for Jeremy and Michael to bump their noses against for good luck.

-

“I’m Chloe, and I’m an alcoholic.”

There’s a chorus of greetings from the small crowd of people squeezed into the seats facing the podium that Chloe’s gripping with white-knuckled hands. Beside her feet, Jake sits and rubs his head against her thigh. In the fourth row, Brooke sits up straighter and spares a glance at Rich, who’s sitting in the second row with a look of fierce pride on his face and giving Chloe a thumbs up.

“I’m not from around here,” Chloe says. Her voice shakes a little, but she still stands tall and speaks with determination. “I grew up in a privileged household in a privileged society, and I was raised to think that I could do anything. And get away with it.”

Chloe’s eyes flutter close for the briefest of moments, then she opens them. Her eyes shine like steel. 

“I’m a hostile drunk, and I was drunk a lot. I’ve made a lot of bad choices that I’m ashamed of. But it never occurred to me to regret any of those until a little less than a year ago. I was at a party. There was a girl there that I hated for a lot of reasons, most of them petty, and I decided to humiliate her by seducing her boyfriend and rubbing it in her face. And it worked. I got him to kiss me, and I was able to reveal it to her face in front of everybody at the party. It was awful of me. But I laughed at her and walked away. Well.” Chloe exhales what could be a laugh or a dry sob. “I tried to.”

There’s only silence in the room.

“Madeleine—the girl—she grabbed me and started screaming at me. She was pretty drunk at that point too, and she was upset. I don’t know how intentional it was or if it was the alcohol or whatever, but she.” Chloe clears her throat. “She almost shoved me off the balcony. And I—I panicked and pushed her off instead.”

Brooke holds her breath.

“It was the third floor and she broke both her legs. She’s recovering now, but. I almost killed her.” Chloe’s voice breaks a little. “Her family sued me, but there were over a dozen witnesses who testified that she attacked me first, and it was all cleared up as an accident. And it was; I didn’t mean to physically harm her. But I went to apologize to her and she said that she wasn’t angry that I pushed her off the balcony. She was angry that I _hurt_ her. That I laughed in her face about it.”

Chloe’s breath stutters out of her and Jake whimpers, pushing his head against her leg, and Chloe reaches down to pet him. “And that’s when I realized that I needed to stop. To stop drinking, to stop hurting people. I realized that I’d done too much damage to ever repair.” She clears her throat. “So, well, I had a rough time trying to quit. I had a lot of panic attacks, and I couldn’t cope well with staying there, so I ended up getting Jake,” she says with a pat to Jake’s head, “and I moved out here. I’m sure my parents are relieved that I’m not embarrassing the family name in front of the public eye anymore.”

For a brief moment, Brooke misses Michael and Jeremy. She wishes they were here so she could hug them.

“I still have a lot of work to do to recover, and a lot of amends to make, but I think I’m getting better. I have Jake to keep me out of my head.” Another pat to Jake’s head. “I have a good sponsor,” Chloe says, looking at Rich, who sends her a wink. “I’ve even made a new friend.” She looks at Brooke. “I think I’m figuring out how to be a better person thanks to them.”

Tears prick at Brooke’s eyes as she nods at Chloe in support, her heart bursting with a flood of emotions as Chloe smiles back, tentative but brave.

“I still have bad days, but I think I’m getting more good days now,” Chloe says, looking out into the crowd. “I’m taking it one day at a time. And I hope it’s the same for all of you.”

After the smattering of applause and as a new person approaches the podium, Chloe slides into the seat beside Brooke’s. Brooke offers her a hand, palm up, and Chloe stares at it for a minute before accepting, gripping Brooke’s fingers back tight in her shaking hand.

There are so many things that Brooke wants to say, so many things Chloe needs to hear, but for now, Brooke simply says, “I’m proud of you.”

She doesn’t say a word about the tears spilling over onto Chloe’s cheeks and instead squeezes Chloe’s hand, feeling her chest fill with warmth when Chloe squeezes back.

-

Opening the door for the pizza delivery boy is a pretty exhausting ordeal when there are three overly excited dogs and one demanding cat all crowding her legs, Brooke learns. She tries her best not to trip over the furry bodies all clamoring for attention and food.

“I’m not giving you any pizza,” she tells them sternly.

Chloe helps her set the coffee table, pouring the soda out into cups full of fresh ice cubes. She’s grinning as she says, “I don’t think they got the message.”

“Oh yeah, my girl doesn’t take no when it comes to food,” Jenna says, fiddling with the remote control so that they can finally start their movie night. “Isn’t that right, Christine?”

Christine barks, her tiny tail wagging furiously.

“Okay, let’s eat!” Brooke cheers, throwing herself onto the couch beside Jenna, and Chloe settles in on her other side. 

Christine perches on Jenna’s lap, eyes on the pizza, and Jake lays at Chloe’s feet and snuffles in contentment. Michael curls up in front of the couch, presenting himself as a warm, fluffy footrest, and Jeremy settles onto the arm of the couch in purring satisfaction, allowing Chloe to pet him.

“Jeremy, you traitor,” Jenna claims in mock-offense. “You didn’t let me touch you for almost a _year_.”

“He likes you,” Brooke tells Chloe, who’s stroking Jeremy’s fur with a look full of awe. 

Brooke grins at the sight and lets a warm glow settle inside her ribcage, basking in the joy of being surrounded by friends she cares about on a Saturday night as the movie starts playing on her television screen. Chloe looks up to meet her gaze, the awe still full in her eyes, and it occurs to Brooke that she’s happy. That there’s space for her to grow _happier_.

Watching a soft smile spread on Chloe’s face, Brooke thinks that she wouldn’t mind making her family a little bigger.

**Author's Note:**

> writing tumblr: [divineprojectzero](http://divineprojectzero.tumblr.com)  
> main tumblr: [listentotheshityousay](http://listentotheshityousay.tumblr.com)  
> twitter: [@listento_yousay](http://twitter.com/listento_yousay)


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